HC orders numbering of houses in all villages

The Punjab and Haryana High Court has directed the Punjab Government to undertake a comprehensive exercise to assign numbers to all houses in villages across the state. A Division Bench also set a one-year deadline to complete the exercise.

The court made it clear that the gram panchayat secretary would be responsible for maintaining and updating the vital record to ensure that every household was accounted for.

The Bench of Justice Sureshwar Thakur and Justice Sudeepti Sharma further made it clear that accurate house numbering was important for facilitating a transparent electoral framework, ensuring effective governance and service delivery.

The court was also of the opinion that the measure was integral to the delimitation of wards, which would ensure that electoral boundaries reflected community demographics and promoted fair representation.

The court added the formation of wards was required to be carried out after keeping geographical contiguity and uniform population size in mind. The Judges also ordered that the delimitation exercise for gram panchayats, panchayat samitis, and zila parishads needed to be publicised extensively through electronic and print media before its commencement.

The court also asserted that it was necessary to issue notifications regarding proposed ward formations alongside site plans illustrating the boundaries of each ward to empower voters to assess and raise objections regarding the ward formations.